


I'll settle for a cup of coffee, but you know what I really need

by fits_in_frames



Category: Supernatural
Genre: M/M, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-05
Updated: 2007-03-05
Packaged: 2018-01-21 12:03:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1549823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fits_in_frames/pseuds/fits_in_frames
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Well, Dean reasons, if Sam isn't going to sleep, then he isn't either. Someone's got to keep an eye on him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'll settle for a cup of coffee, but you know what I really need

**Author's Note:**

> _said leave me to lay, but touch me deep_  
>  _i don't sleep, i dream_  
>  _i'll settle for a cup of coffee_  
>  _but you know what i really need_  
>  {r.e.m. // i don't sleep, i dream}  
> 
> 
> Spoilers through "Scarecrow".

It starts after Catasauqua. Sam can't sleep and Dean knows that Sam can't sleep, but neither of them say anything about it anymore. Well, Dean reasons, if Sam isn't going to sleep, then he isn't either. Someone's got to keep an eye on him. So he puts his arm in front of his face and watches Sam lie on his back, his hands linked over his belly, his breathing uneven and shallow. When his eyelids feel heavy, he runs his tongue along the inside of his bottom lip; when his legs get jumpy, he shifts his hips a fraction of an inch and wiggles his toes.

Dean's used to driving on one, two hours of sleep, with fatigue lingering in the back of his throat like not-quite-ripe strawberries and day-old coffee. He's used to the hollow feeling in his sinuses, the fuzz in the pit of his stomach, the fiery nerve endings in his fingertips. He lets Sam nod off in the front seat, sniffs quietly and bites the inside of his cheek. Sam writhes in his sleep, moans Jessica's name, smacks his hand against the window. Dean does his best to ignore it and reaches for the ever-constant Mountain Dew between them. Sam always asks the same question when he jolts upright, _why did you let me fall asleep_ , and Dean always replies by switching his hands on the steering wheel.

*

They stop for the night in a little town near the Ohio-Pennsylvania border on their way to Toledo. Sam has his shoes off before he's even halfway in the room, and he's channel-surfing by the time Dean puts his bag down. Ten minutes later, Dean announces over his shoulder that he's going on a beer run, and gets no response. He glances over at Sam: his head is resting on the fake headboard behind him, his mouth is open and his eyes are closed. Dean smiles and locks the door behind him.

When he returns twenty minutes later, Sam is gone, the sheets on Sam's bed rumpled in a vague Sam-shape, _Friends_ reruns blaring on the TV. He turns it off and hears the quiet clinking of shirt buttons against porcelain, and slowly, carefully, opens the bathroom door. Sam is shuddering into the edge of the toilet, forehead against his forearm, skin pale and clammy.

"Oh God," Dean says, and kneels down next to him.

"Why did you..." Sam starts, but then he sputters, coughs, and barely lifts his head in time to not vomit all over himself. Dean rubs his back for a long time and tells him it's going to be all right, even if he doesn't believe it.

*

Somewhere between Ohio and Missouri, Dean falls asleep behind the wheel. It's only for a second, and they're on an open stretch of interstate, but it still scares the shit out of him. His heart races and he glances over at Sam, who is staring out the window, chin cupped in his hand. The faint, chilly light of morning filters through a stray lock of hair and Dean can't take his eyes away. There's a sudden tightness in his chest, which is not helping the blood pounding in his ears. And then the road gets rough beneath his feet and he realizes that's because he's not even _on_ the road anymore and he swears and slams on the brakes and feels Sam's shocked expression before he sees it.

"What the fuck was that?" Sam says after a beat.

Dean doesn't respond right away, tries to blink away the image of dawnlight dancing on the bridge of Sam's nose, takes a deep breath, licks his lips. "Sorry," he says. "Dozed off."

*

Dean lets Sam drive for a stretch after St. Louis. He puts on some pussy radio station that never gets static and plays the Talking Heads back-to-back with John Mayer. Dean wants to protest, but he passes out before he can even open his mouth. He doesn't dream and when Sam shakes him awake, they're at a gas station and the sun is in his eyes. He blinks, groans, stretches his arms above his head. Sam is at the back of the car, supposedly filling the tank. He leans out the window and calls, "Where are we?"

"Dunno," Sam says. "Iowa, I think."

Dean pulls back into the car and shuffles through some papers on the front seat. He doesn't look up when Sam practically falls into the driver's seat. Both of them are wide awake until they stop for the night.

*

There's no rooms in any of the motels in town, so they pull up to the bed & breakfast they passed on the way in. The lady at the counter eyes them suspiciously and laughs when they ask for two separate beds. Says there's no need to be ashamed, she's not one of those bigoted freaks. Cuts Dean off before he can explain that yes, they're attached at the hip, and yes, they're overly-comfortable with each other, and yes, they're both incredibly attractive, but that's because they're _brothers_ , so he says it to himself as they trudge wearily up the stairs.

When the door closes behind them, they just stare at the bed for a minute, and then Dean says, "You're not going to sleep anyway, so you might as well let me have it."

He looks over at Sam, who is glaring at him. "Fuck you," Sam says, and plops himself down, holds his face in his hands, the heels of his palms digging into his cheekbones.

Dean's legs are crawling and at least ninety percent of his joints feel like they're going to explode. and there's nowhere else to sit, so he sits at the foot of the bed and takes off his boots. When he turns around again, Sam's shoulders are hunched over and his head is down and his legs are clamped together.

He stands up and reaches out to touch Sam's back and says, "Sammy, I--"

"Shut the fuck up," Sam says, bends over, takes off his shoes and shirt and contorts himself to get under the covers.

Dean will be damned if he's going to sleep on the goddamn floor, so he takes off his jacket and jeans and gets into the bed next to Sam (he silently thanks Dad for teaching him that old trick of getting under the blanket but not the sheet), curling up on his side, facing away from Sammy. He turns off the light and stares at his hands until his eyes adjust, and then he watches the trees wave in the night breeze and listens to Sam's quiet breathing and imagines the two are connected.

Two hours later, he's woken up (my god, he was sleeping?) by an arm colliding with his hip. He almost jumps out of bed and grabs his gun before he remembers that it's just Sam, it's only Sam, flailing in his sleep. He squirms around, turning himself over, until he can see the wild locks of Sam-hair that are sticking up.

"Sam?" he asks. He raises himself up on his elbow. "Hey, Sammy, you awake?" Sam's breathing is shallow again--ragged and nasally and dry--and that can only mean one thing, _nightmare_ , but he asks, "Hey, Sam, what is it?" anyway. Sam makes a little noise, somewhere between a whimper and a sob and a cough, and Dean automatically puts a hand on his shoulder. Sam is shivering slightly, despite the overbearing warmth coming from the radiator. "Hey," Dean says, and wraps his arm around Sam, resting his hand on his chest. He remembers doing this when they were kids, remembers the impression of his little brother's hips in his belly lingering until the next day. Sam was smaller than him then, and Dean's words seemed to have more of an impact for some reason, but he tests them out anyway. "Hey Sammy, it's okay. Dean's here."

Sam's breathing evens out a little, and he adjusts his head on the pillow. He makes another sound, this time a mixture of a sigh and a snore, and then his body goes limp. He sleeps the rest of the night, and Dean is left drawing little patterns on his brother's chest with his thumb.

*

After Lawrence, they get drunk. Not just a little bit drunk--no no, they get pissass, oh-man-I-was-so-wasted-last-night, rolling-around-on-the-floor-singing-Lynyrd-Skynyrd drunk. Sam will probably never admit to that last one, but right now he's waving his arms around, spilling beer all over the floor and himself, shouting out a vaguely on-pitch version of _lord knows i can't chaaaange_. Dean does another shot, slams the glass down on the shitty motel-room table. God, the alcohol feels so good burning in his mouth, his throat, his eyes, but it's not taking away his vision of Mom burning again. _God fucking dammit_ , he thinks, and pours himself another shot.

Sam half-sits up and slurs, "Dean, t'row me 'nuther beer, wouldya?"

Dean swallows and cringes and shakes his head. "No, Sam, you've had enough."

"No fair," Sam mumbles and tries to push himself to half-standing, but falls painfully on his tailbone and whacks his head against the frame of the bed. "Fuck!" he yelps, but by the time Dean stumbles over, he's laughing hysterically.

"What's so goddamn funny?" Dean snarls. The half-bottle of whiskey is not sitting well in his stomach.

"You," Sam gasps between heaves of laughter. "You--you're so drunk."

"So are you," Dean says. "Now, let me see the back of your head." He feels the bumps of Sam's skull with his fingertips, looks directly into Sam's eyes before he realizes that he's way too drunk to even know what size Sam's pupils normally are. It's then that Sam grabs his arms and kisses him, hard.

Sam's tongue is wet and sloppy and then he realizes that this means _oh god_ , Sam's fucking _tongue_ is in his fucking _mouth_ and shitshitshit, this isn't happening. Except that it is. He thinks this must be what being struck by lightning feels like--there's a fire in his cheeks, his lips, his belly, the ends of his toes--and so he does the only thing he can think to do: he kisses Sam back, and then knocks him over on to the floor, straddling his hips. Sam's hair is going in every direction, his hands are lingering in the air after being separated from Dean's arms, his lips are red and swollen and _oh jesus_ , his dick is hard under Dean's thigh. _Must be the alcohol_ , Dean thinks. _Must be some sort of sick fantasy he has, fucking his brother while he's drunk as piss_ , Dean thinks. He shifts slightly on top of Sam, and feels his own cock press painfully against the inside of his jeans. _Well, fuck_ , Dean thinks.

"No," he says out loud, more for himself than Sam. "No." He stands up, almost too fast and, ignoring Sam's little perverted squawk of protest, zigzags into the bathroom, slams the door behind him. He watches himself in the mirror and he wants to smash it with his forehead but no, he's not _that_ drunk, so he pounds his fist on the wall and--oh fuck no, he's not going to fucking _cry_ about this, he's not a _pussy_ and it's not like Sam fucked him or anything. It was just a kiss, just a product of stress and close quarters and alcohol and all this goddamned testosterone pulsing in their veins. He leans up against the sink and he realizes, shit, he's still hard, and an involuntary strangled sound comes out of his throat, so he yanks down his pants and jerks himself off ( _not thinking of Sam at all, not the sincerity in his eyes, not his pretty little mouth, no no no_ ) and comes, quietly, into the sink. And then he remembers how very, very drunk he is and zips himself up in barely enough time to sit on the edge of the toilet, head in his hands. _Fuck_ , he thinks.

There's a knock at the door, and then Sam calls, "Hey, Dean?" When Dean doesn't respond, he just comes in. "Hey Dean, I'm--"

"I swear to God, Sammy, if you say you're sorry, I'm going to kick you in the balls." He looks up at Sam, who's still looking disheveled and ravaged and probably still tastes like the cheap beer and the indeterminately sour something that's lingering on the roof of Dean's mouth.

They just stare at each other for a second, and then Sam says, seeming very small, "All right."

Dean exhales, finally. "All right," he echoes, scrambling for some kind of coherency. "All right, here's what we're going to do. We're going to pass out in separate beds, we're going to wake up with incredible hangovers and we're going to take showers and brush our teeth and get dressed and we're going to say, 'man, we were so wasted last night' and then we're going to leave this place in the fucking dust and we're never going to bring this up again. Okay?"

"Okay," Sam says to the floor.

"Okay," Dean says again, and barges past Sam into the main room. He strips off his jacket and his jeans and curls up under the shitty motel blanket and closes his eyes and tries to will his head to stop spinning. He hears Sam squeak into the other bed and when he wakes up hours later and pukes into the garbage pail between them, Sam doesn't even stir.

*

Dean's beginning to wonder if that night in Kansas (was it in Kansas?) was just a dream. He'll see Sam out of the corner of his eye while he's driving, see that look on his face like he wants to say something, but then he swallows and it's gone. He's certainly not going to bring it up--what would he say, _hey, you remember that time you kissed me? what the fuck was that about?_ , yeah that would go over well--so he coughs into his fingers and keeps driving.

*

(When Sam leaves, the fact that he won't have to keep one eye open at night anymore outweighs the dull ache in his chest, and he's almost relieved.)


End file.
